Paper+Books

=Paper Books =

Explore prior knowledge.  List what we think we already know? History: The history of altered books started in medieval times. The original altered book was called a palimpsest. It was a common practice in medieval times to rub out an earlier piece of writing by washing or scraping the manuscript, in order to prepare it for a new text. The motive for making palimpsests seems to have been largely economic.
 * You need any type of book, old ones are fun to work with.
 * Come up with a theme
 * Glue pages together so you can cut out and make the pages thicker

One writer during the medieval times gave altered books in their literal meaning; Archimedes Palimpsest, a 10th century Altered Book. Monks had written down one of Archimedes' Treatises, then later they took the pages from the text, scratched out the original text, rebound the pages into a prayer book and wrote another text. This was common practice for all the people during that time due to the lack of technology to mass produce paper and texts.

This website gives more detailed history of the altered books.

http://www.donna-engstrom-abstract-art.com/altered_book_history.html

Materials: All right -- here's what you'll need for a basic altered book:
 * A book
 * basic art supplies -- brushes, your favorite paints and/or mediums, that kind of thing
 * scissors
 * glue
 * a craft knife (like an XActo)
 * papers, collage materials, 3-D stuff


 * STEPS**:

Get a book. This isn't necessarily as easy as it sounds, but it's not as hard as it sometimes is made out to be. There are few things you should look for when you're getting started with an altered book:
 * FIRST STEP:**
 * Hardcover is better than glue-bound softcovers. This is because soft-bound or glue-bound books are much more likely to fall apart at the seams, leaving you with a nice collection of loose pages that are wonderful pieces of art on their own right, but not quite what you're probably looking for as an altered book.
 * If you're worried about exhibiting the book after it's done to your satisfaction, look for books that are OUT of copyright range -- generally speaking, 75 years from publication.

library book sales and clearance sales at the local bookstores are great. (Plus, library book sales are cheap, and the money goes to a good cause....new books!) UAPL has them all the time.

Generally speaking, most books don't have pages that are thick enough to withstand a whole lot of abuse. To combat this, the best thing to do is glue pages together. you can do this a few different ways:
 * STEP TWO: PREP-WORK**

1. With a glu-stick, like UHU, that's archival and easy to use. If you do it this way, work quickly and cover pages all the way to the edge. They -are- more prone to come apart later, so know ahead of time that if your book will get a lot of abuse, you're going to want to use a different method.

2. With brush-on glue. Some use YES! paste (which I'm not fond of because of its quick drying time), or gel medium, If you put it on thinly, it doesn't warp the pages much at all.Paint on your glue and close the book.

When you open it back up (right away), you'll probably have to smooth it out a bit with the edge of a bone folder (bookbinding tool), or the side of a ruler -- that gets out most of your air bubbles and imperfections.

You can glue every few pages together, or leave big gaps of unglued pages between "spreads", or pages on which to put your artwork. I generally do the latter, since you'll sometimes have to remove a few pages here and there to keep your book from puffing out into a sculpture piece when it's done -- it adds more room at the spine so it doesn't "poof", and lays relatively flat that way.

There are tons of things you can do to prepare your pages for work on top of them. Some people leave them entirely as-is, and use the words as a background in itself, or highlight certain words, so that the artwork and the original book form are fused together in a way. Alternately, you can paint over part or the whole of the page, so that you can do other types of artwork on top. (Collage being the most popular -- though there's nothing stopping you from doing original paintings or drawings on them, as well.)
 * STEP THREE: PAGE PREPARATION**

Textured ones: 1. Paint the page with gesso and let dry. It's okay if there's brushmarks -- you WANT brushstrokes to show. 2. Heat it with a heat gun or let it dry naturally. 3. With Portfolio water-soluble oil pastels, scribble on the page. When you're satisfied with the color combination, heat them again slightly with the heat gun. 4. Working quickly, rub your fingers in a circular motion around the page to work the colors together. Keep "buffing" with your fingertips until the gesso's texture shows through the layer of pastel. (I find it works best to gradually go with lighter and lighter pressure with your fingers, which makes the oil pastel pull away from only the raised areas.) Keep prepping your pages however you'd like, and we'll move on to adding stuff to the backgrounds next.


 * STEP FOUR: ADDING STUFF**

Go to [|http://www.ebsqart.com/arthttp://www.ebsqart.com/artMagazine/za_271.htm]

To see how to Add stuff. All the above info was found there.

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